Cloud–Fog Automation: Heterogenous Applications Over New-Generation Infrastructure of Virtualized Computing and Converged Networks

The emergence of virtualized computing and converged networks has the potential to revolutionize industrial automation systems, offering unprecedented levels of flexibility and scalability that were previously unattainable with traditional infrastructure. Therefore, cloud–fog automation (CFA) platforms are becoming key players not only in coordinating production task management in upper-layer applications but also in handling real-time control and monitoring by edge devices. In this article, we discuss how cloud/fog-based virtualization and converged communication networks can allow for flexible deployment of automation use cases and evaluate the impacts introduced by the less deterministic infrastructure from the perspective of control. Four representative use cases are studied using our in-house-developed CFA platform to demonstrate the smart coordination of automation in a variety of real-life prototypes. Moreover, the capabilities of commercial off-the-shelf virtualized computing and converged networks are characterized, which confirms that the CFA platform as an essential part of the future industrial infrastructure for hosting heterogenous control applications is not a “daydream.”